Cold December Nights
by EveryDayBella
Summary: This is the story of two boys who were chased from the only home they've ever known, and one Christmas Eve that brings them back.
1. Christmas 1939

**AN: **Merry Christmas Eve! I decided to write some Stucky to celebrate. Muchos Love to Angelycdevil and MyHeroin for flailing all over my doc and my twitter. I love you guys.. Mwah!

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><p><strong>Cold December Nights<strong>

**Christmas 1939**

"Bucky!" Sally leaps into her big brothers arms the moment he walks through the door. "Look what Santa brought me!"

"Woah!" Bucky over exaggerates his expressions as the girl shows him the little brown bag filled with hard candies. "You hit the jackpot, Sally!"

"Ma says I shouldn't eat them all once, but its hard."

"Maybe you should share?" Bucky flutters his lashes in the same manner he used to pick up girls. Sally, however, is on to her brother and clutches her bag tightly to her chest.

"No. They're my candy."

"Please?" Bucky pleads, drawing the word out into multiple syllables. "I can't remember the last time I had something sweet."

"Don't let him get to you, Sally." Steve appears around Bucky's shoulder. "He had a milkshake two nights ago."

"Stevie!" Sally jumps from Bucky to Steve. Steve catches her with a grunt and a shy smile.

Bucky smirks as Sally starts talking Steve's ear off. He's glad his sisters get along so well with Steve, and that he'd been able to guilt Steve into spending Christmas with his family. Sarah Rogers has only been gone for eight months and Bucky doesn't want Steve alone in their apartment the whole day. That isn't right and Bucky won't have it.

"Ma, we're here!" Bucky says as he shrugs out of his coat. The thing is so threadbare that he doesn't know why he wears it. It does nothing to keep out the cold, but who has the money for a new one?

"Bucky." Linda Barnes is a short woman with auburn hair and a quick smile. Bucky isn't ashamed to admit that he's a momma's boy. Always had been. He leans over to kiss her cheek while trying to snatch a cookie off the counter. He yelps when she slaps his fingers. "Don't even think of it, young man."

"Yes, Ma."

"Where's Steve? He did come with you, didn't he?"

"Yeah, Sally cornered him in the living room." Bucky ignores the fluttering in his chest that always occurs when he thought about how perfectly Steve fit in with his family. That would only bring trouble.

"How is he?"

"He's okay." Bucky shrugs. "Been better. I mean who wouldn't be, but he's acting more like himself." Bucky didn't tell her that he still woke up sometimes and hear Steve crying. Steve didn't even know that Bucky knew that.

"Are you two still getting into fights?" His mother smiles sweetly at him and he starts sweating under his collar.

"Well, yeah, but I swear, Ma, I don't start them."

Linda laughs, and Bucky can't help joining in. "I would expect nothing else, sweetheart. I'm glad he's got you."

Bucky coughs to hide his blush. He doesn't need his mother to know the feelings he's been hiding for years now. It will break her heart. Its already bad enough that he won't settle down with a nice girl and start giving her grandkids.

"Is Dad gonna make it?" Bucky asks as a distraction and because he's been dying to know. It's been a couple of weeks since he's seen the old man, and while he wouldn't mind making it a couple more, he does need to make sure that Ma and the girls are being looked after.

"I don't think so. He's working."

Bucky grits his teeth so hard that he can hear them grinding together. Worthless piece of… "Has he been here at all in the last week?"

His mother doesn't answer for a moment, and Bucky has to fight the urge to race out the door and hunt the fucker down. "A couple nights."

"Son of a bitch."

"Now, don't you start James Buchanan Barnes." Linda rounds on her son, and Bucky wishes just once that he was smart enough or rich enough to really take care of her and his sisters. She deserved better than this tiny apartment in a bad neighborhood, even if it was a step up from from the even tinier apartment in an even worse neighborhood like his and Steve's. "He's doing the best he can. The past few years have been hard."

"They've been hard on everybody, Ma. That doesn't give him an excuse to blow it all on booze and women."

"He pays the rent." Linda sighs. "And there's food on the table. It's a damn sight more than some people got."

"You deserve better, Ma. You, Becca, Annie, and Sally. You all deserve better than that deadbeat. I hate him." Bucky admits in a whisper.

"Ah, sweetheart." Linda pulls Bucky down into a hug. "It's alright. We make do with what we got and we'll survive. It'll be alright. You'll see."

"He made you cry, Ma." Bucky ordered his burning eyes not to do the same. He wouldn't do it. He'd be the strong one. He did it for Steve and he could do it for his Ma, too.

"I know he did." Linda smiles and Bucky knows it isn't real. He sees the same thing in the mirror often enough. "I'd leave him if I could, but it's just not an option. Like I said, there's a roof over our heads and food in our bellies, which is more than I think I can say for you. You're thinner than you were a week ago, Bucky."

Bucky shrugs. He's skipped a couple of meals to buy Steve some cold medicine, not that Steve knew that. If he were being honest, he's starving, but he would never admit to it in his life. He would skip a lot more than a few meals if it meant that Steve was healthy. "I'm fine, Ma."

Linda humphs. "You can't lie to your mother, Bucky. It's Christmas. Enough with the unpleasant topics. We should be celebrating. We're all alive and together. That's what's important. Why don't you go save your Steve from Sally and send the girls in here to set the table. Dinner's almost ready."

Bucky tries not to linger on the way she'd said "your Steve."

In the end, it turns out to be a pretty good day. The meal, while meager, is delicious and Bucky practically inhales everything he's given. Steve brought the copy of Monopoly they'd bought last time they had some spending money and they taught Bucky's family to play. Steve ends up beating them all, but he smiles a couple of times, which Bucky takes for a victory. Afterward, Bucky turns the radio on and teaches Becca how to dance the Charleston, which then means he has to dance with all the girls. Sally had just stood on his toes, but Bucky figures that counts.

All afternoon, Bucky tries to force the thought away that it should be his father here taking care of his sisters. It festers in his mind, dark and ugly, next to other equally dark and ugly thoughts. Bucky wants to run out into the darkening day, find the bastard, and drag him home, but that won't accomplish anything. Then, he thinks of a plan to hit him where it would hurt him.

The sun is going down before Bucky and Steve say good night and start walking home. Bucky pulls his coat tighter around him, trying to ward off the chill and gathering snow.

"You need a new coat." Steve mentions.

"I'm fine." Bucky grumbles, and then brightens when he remembers what's clinking in his large pockets. "Besides, I got something to warm us when we get home."

"What did you do?" Steve asks with a groan.

"I snuck into my father's liquor stash." Bucky grins brightly, perhaps a little too brightly. "Merry Christmas to that asshole and Merry Christmas to us."

They sit on the stairs in front of their apartment because it's just as cold outside as inside, so why not sit there and drink corn whiskey straight from the bottle? Neither says anything until Bucky's starting to slip from just tipsy to full on drunk and he's not watching what his saying anymore. "He's just such an asshole, you know? He leaves her to fend for herself and Sally is ten years old for god's sake. You would think he could be there for Christmas."

"It's not fair." Steve agrees in an instant and takes another sip from his bottle. "At least she got nine of them though. I didn't get any."

Bucky snorts. "Yeah sure. Remember last Christmas? He got so wasted that he almost set the apartment on fire. Selfish bastard."

"Maybe they're better off without him?"

Bucky grunts and swallows another mouthful of burning liquid that settles in his stomach like a rock. "What happens to them if I'm ever not there?"

"Planning on going somewhere, pal?" It could just be the drunk talking, but Bucky thinks Steve might just be worried.

"No. Nowhere to go. Nowhere I want to go. Just fine right here. Just working at the docks ain't exactly safe, ya know? Accidents happen all the time. I seen 'em. It scares me sometimes to think that it could happen to me, then what would Ma and the girls and you do?"

"Nothing is going to happen to you, Buck." Steve hiccups and Bucky giggles. "Shut up. The universe would cease to function if Bucky Barnes didn't exist."

"Damn, Rogers. I didn't know you loved me so much." Bucky grins, waggles his eyebrows, and giggles some more. He's going to feel this in the morning, but for the moment everything feels good and fuzzy and the morning is distant. He can deal with it then.

"Yeah, love that stupid, smug grin of yours." Steve snorts. His cheeks turn pink and how has Bucky not noticed how damn pretty Steve is? His slender throat, sharp nose, cheekbones that he wants to trace with his thumbs. Bucky saves the best for last. Steve's lips twisted into a grin, soft and pink and kissable.

Bucky wants to kiss Steve. He's wanted that since he was sixteen. He knows it's wrong, or he's been told it's wrong, he can't quite work out why. Either way though, these feeling of his could get Steve in trouble and that isn't acceptable. That doesn't stop him from wanting it though. Those pink lips pressed against his own, sharp hipbones under his hands, finding the pulse point on Steve's neck with his tongue.

Bucky shakes himself before he can act on his own thoughts. Can't have that. Have to keep it together. Steve probably doesn't want that anyway.

"Hey, Steve?"

"Yeah, Buck?"

"Next year I'll get you something better than whiskey I stole from my father. I promise."

"Don't worry about it." Steve shrugs and Bucky has to swallow thickly. "This is kinda great, really."

Bucky snorts and looks away. It suddenly hurts to look at Steve. He's too damn much. "Merry Christmas, Steve."

"Merry Christmas, Bucky."

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><p><strong>AN: <strong>The next chapter will in the morning. Enjoy your holidays!


	2. Christmas 2015

**AN: **MERRY CHRISTMAS MY DARLINGS! I hope you all have a wonderful day. *smoochies*

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><p><strong>Christmas 2015<strong>

"How did Stark get that up there?"

"He's an idiot."

"I guess it helps that his suit can fly." Steve muses, squinting up at the top of Avenger Tower where a huge blowup sprig of mistletoe has been hung. "Erskine should have added flying powers to the super soldier serum."

"Not gonna lie, Cap," Clint draws easily. "If you could fly, and I couldn't, I just might have to kill myself."

"Oh, don't be so melodramatic." Nat speaks up from Steve's other side. "Just cause your code name is Hawkeye."

"Sam's is Falcon and he can fly."

"The whining does not become you, Clint." Natasha smiles that indulgent smile that only comes around Clint. Steve grins a little. He definitely picked the right side in that bet.

He leaves them to it and wanders back inside. He hasn't seen Bucky in a while and it's starting to worry him a little. He's trying not to, Bucky's been back with him for almost a year and he's doing okay. He still doesn't like groups of people though, and Steve figures Christmas is hard on him though he likes the Avengers.

Inside Tony's penthouse, there's soft christmas music playing, Pepper and Jane sit at the kitchen bar laughing at something, Tony and Thor sit on the couch while Tony tries to explain football to the norse god. Sam and Bruce are suspiciously close to the egg nog and Steve suspects they're spiking it. It's a cozy, familiar enough scene even if it was a far cry from the tiny sparse Christmas' he had growing up.

Steve purposely ignores the little twigs of mistletoe that were hung in every doorway. Tony had been trying to catch odd couples all day.

Sometimes, Steve decides, Tony is much worse than Howard.

"Has anyone seen Bucky?" Steve asks the room at large. He felt kinda bad having lost track him. Bucky tends to stay on the outside of the group. Steve understands why of course, but he is supposed to be helping Bucky reintegrate himself into the world. Instead, he'd gotten distracted by giant mistletoe on the roof.

"He went downstairs about ten minutes ago," Sam offers. "Said he needed some space. I was gonna come get you pretty soon."

Steve nods, squares his shoulders, and heads for the elevator. "I'll be back soon. I hope."

There is no telling what state Bucky will be in when he gets down there. If Bucky needs to stay in their apartment for the rest of the afternoon and evening, then so will Steve. What ever Bucky needs, that was what Steve did.

Bucky is more important than anything.

When Steve gets off the elevator, he shivers. It's too cold in the apartment. Bucky doesn't handle the cold well. Steve finds it unlikely that he'll stay somewhere that feels like an ice chest.

"Buck?" Steve calls, snagging his jacket off the back of the couch where he left it. "You here?"

Wandering back to the bedroom, he finds the source of the draft. The door to the balcony has been left open and it is twenty eight degrees outside. He steps out to find Bucky leaning against the rail, staring down at the street miles below them. His long hair is hanging loose, hiding his face, which means that Steve can't read him. His shoulders are tense though. Something was bothering him.

"When did you start smoking again?" Steve asked breezily, leaning up against the railing next to him.

Bucky smirks, not the cocky, arrogant smirk from their childhood, but the rough, barely recognizable one. "I didn't know you knew I smoked back then."

"I caught you a couple times." Bucky would either smoke at the docks or out on the fire escape. He didn't ever tell Steve because Bucky didn't want to make his asthma worse. Mrs. Barnes had told Steve so that he could keep an eye on her boy. "Just didn't ever say anything."

Bucky shrugs deeper into his coat and takes a long, slow drag from the cigarette in his right hand. Steve looks away before he can do something stupid. "I stole these from Clint."

"Can you even feel anything from those any more?"

"Not a damn thing." Bucky smirks at him, but it doesn't reach his dark, concerned eyes. "It's like drinking those three whiskeys last night. Tony was on his way to smashed, and I was there completely sober."

"It's the serum."

"No shit."

"Sorry, pal." Steve sighs. "You okay?"

"Right as rain." Bucky says, and it's too bright and airy to be real. His face falls not long after. "It was just getting to be a bit much up there, ya know. I needed some air. You can go back. You don't have to stay out here with me in the cold."

Steve makes a show of settling in against the wall. "If you're waiting out here in the cold, then so am I. Told you, I'm not going anywhere."

Bucky snorts and rolls his eyes, but the first real smile graces his face. "Thanks."

"Anytime, Bucky." He's better, he really is, but Steve knows he's never getting the friend from his childhood back. That had been a bitter pill to swallow. Bucky is getting better though, and Steve has hope that they can salvage something. Anything is better than nothing.

Bucky takes a drag from his cigarette and Steve purposely ignores the way his lips form a pout to blow the smoke back through. "So," Bucky says with an ironic smile. "I've been trying to remember Christmas."

"Okay. What have you got?"

"Just flashes." Bucky shrugs. "Snow. Lots of snow. Um, a tree. Going ice skating."

"I know which one that is." Steve offers helpfully. He tries to fight the happy grin as the memory sweeps over him. "When we were fourteen, I think, 1931, your father took you, me, and your sisters to Rockefeller plaza to go skating. You teased me the whole time because I was too unstable to stay on my skates."

Bucky giggles. Steve has to freeze in shock because he can't remember the last time he heard that sound. Since before the war at least. It's musical, rich, smooth, and raises goosebumps on his arms. It's so happy and Steve wants to cry because for just a moment, Bucky's happy. "You were so skinny. I kept thinking that you were gonna break your ass on the ice and I'd have to carry you home."

"You remember?"

"Yeah." Bucky's gazing into the sky line, but he's not seeing the New York skyscrapers. Not today's at least. There's a wet sheen in his grey-blue eyes, and Steve chokes back a sob. "I mean, I remember some of it. Um, my, ugh, sister. Yeah, she's my sister, what was her name?"

"Which one, the oldest? Long brown hair, eyes like yours, always teasing someone? That's Rebecca, but we all called her Becca. I could probably find a picture, if you want."

"Not right now." He shrugs both shoulders and crushes the cigarette under his boot. "Um, what were the others names?"

"Annie was the middle one, and Sally the youngest." Steve wants to celebrate. Bucky hasn't remembered much of his family. This is a huge step. "Sally wasn't there that day. She was still pretty young. They adored you. You remember that?"

"Yeah, I think I do." Bucky is staring into space, but there's also fine tremors beginning to snake through his body. "Why?"

Steve has been doing this for long enough to know that Bucky isn't seeing himself clearly. "You're thier big brother. You were four years older than Becca, much less the other two... you were their hero. Your dad wasn't around much after '36 and you looked out for them. You were a protective sonuvabitch."

Bucky briefly bites down on the plump swell of his bottom lip. Steve forces away the thought of how much he's always wanted to do that. This is his best friend, and he doesn't need the extra complications of Steve's feelings. Maybe, when Bucky is much much better Steve will find the guts to tell him how he really feels.

Maybe.

"Do you ever miss that part of me?" Bucky doesn't give him the chance to answer before he's rambling on. "Like when I wasn't like this. When I could stare down an entire legion of Hydra forces, or dance with every dame in the dance hall? I know you have to. He's the me you know, or knew. I don't know, it's confusing. I just, I miss him, or being him, and being enough to make you happy."

"Woah, woah, woah." Steve usually lets Bucky ramble if he wants to. Expression isn't something that comes easy to him. If he needs to talk then Steve will let him talk, but he isn't going to let Bucky poison himself either. "You make me happy. Even when you're having a bad day and snapping at everything that moves, you make me happy. Everyday, every night, without fail, because you're here. You're alive, and I don't have to do this future thing without my best friend. Do I miss the kid I grew up with? Sure, but I miss the scrawny punk you grew up with, too. I miss my mom, and your mom, and your sisters to death. I do, but we can't go back, so we've got no where to go but forward. I'm glad I've got you on my left."

Bucky looks at him open mouthed and wide eyed for just a moment. Then he moves, and Steve doesn't have a chance to think before Bucky's lips are on his lips, Bucky's hands gripping his shoulders, and every long line of him is pressed against Steve's front. Steve gasps in shock, breath leaving his lungs because Bucky is right here and Steve can feel him and hear him. He doesn't think before grabbing his waist and pulling him closer, opening his mouth and swallowing his moans. Bucky tastes like tobacco and the pumpkin pie, but he also tastes like Bucky. Perfect, damaged, and just Bucky.

Bucky is the best grenade Steve has ever thrown himself on.

Steve clings like he's afraid Bucky will slip through his fingers. Bucky's hands twist into Steve's jacket with something like desperation. His arms are full of warmth, of the solid mass that is Bucky. Steve pulls and nudges, changing the angle of Bucky's face and devouring his mouth. Steve might not have started this kiss, but he sure as hell is going to finish it.

He's got seventy years to make up for after all.

Bucky pulls away, and Steve lets him go, remembering how fragile the man in his arms is and that sometimes he just needs space. Bucky doesn't go far, his fingers don't loosen on Steve's jacket. The beginnings of a scarlet blush are beginning to creep up his cheeks though. While his arms are still locked around his waist, Steve can feel him shaking. "I'm sorry." Bucky gasps, not meeting Steve's worried gaze. "I didn't mean—I mean, I don't know what...I shouldn't have—aw, fuck."

"Bucky." Steve pulls and Bucky comes closer until Steve's lips can find his best friends friend's and press a reassuring kiss against his skin. Now that Steve has kissed him once he doesn't want to stop. Ever. "Bucky, to be perfectly honest, there are two people I've ever really wanted to kiss. One was Peggy and the other was you, and you outdate Peggy by about ten years."

Backy laughs and Steve wishes he could bottle that sound and drown in it. It's better than the most beautiful piece of music he's ever heard and it breaks him as much as it rebuilds him. He's smiling when Bucky looks up and his eyes are brighter than Steve can ever remember seeing them and he's bone deep, bubbling happy. Steve will do whatever it takes to make this man smile for the rest of his life.

"When I told you I was with you until the end of the line, I was just trying to say I love you."

Steve laughs because what else do you do when your best friend admits to being in love with you for seventy years? Bucky pulls him down, smothers his laugh with his lips.

Their both lost and both found.

Both coming home on a cold December night.


End file.
